“We must work together to take NZ-India relations to a higher plane”
What do you think of the change from heading one of the biggest wings of the Indian armed forces to diplomacy?
Well, to begin with, in both instances you work for the policies of the government – and there’s diplomacy in both. The navy is somewhat different from the other armed forces in that it has diplomacy as one of the rules of the game. Traditionally it has been so: there is a miliary role, there is a policing role and then there is the diplomatic role. That’s the traditional triangle that we have had always for all navies, developed by the Royal Navy way back in 19th century.
In fact there is a piece that I came across where at one time the funding for the Royal Navy was being reduced so the first Sea Lord, the chief of the Royal Navy, went up to the government and said, since he had no money they would not be building any more ships and then the foreign minister came up and he said, look if the Royal Navy does not get more ships then how do you expect the foreign ministry to do the job that it was supposed to do?
What I am saying is that there has always been a link between the navy and diplomacy – we send ships abroad, fly the flag. Our ships are, shall we say, the sovereign Indian territory on the sea and wherever they visit they represent a mini India and that’s been happening to all the countries. Having said that, this is it is definitely quite a different kind of a job and I am still finding my feet but as I said, in my last job, interacting with my peers, my counterparts also with the ministerial set ups in many countries was part of the job. I was travelling several times a year to different countries and building up a rapport meeting with defence ministers and officials. So it was a little bit of, shall I say, grooming for this kind of a job. I am very happy that our government asked me to come to New Zealand.
To use a phrase from your previous stellar career, you are still testing the waters here in New Zealand at the moment. What are your first impressions?
My first impressions are that as far as people are concerned they are particularly good across the board, hospitable, approachable, full of life always.
What message do you bring to this country?
The thing that has really changed over the years now, more so in the recent past, is the fact that India has arrived. This is because of the economic growth of the past decade or so. It is also very noticeable that while the whole world is going through a recession, India is one of the few countries, which has maintained a decent growth in GDP.
All of us are familiar with it, and we probably clock 7% this year while everybody else has gone negative. So we’ve had no recession, we’ve had growth and it stems from two factors – one is that we have a very strong middle class and this middle is the one that is making money, driving the economy, driving consumption and this middle class is 300 million plus that is equal to the population of the entire United States but there are another 800-900 million that have to go along. Now it is a very noticeable change in their lifestyle also. If you are in India, it is quite noticeable but there is a long way to go still. The government is taking steps, hopefully the trickle down effect will percolate, permeate to the lowest masses.
So the way the world is now looking at India because of this 300 million educated population, and the second part is demographics because if you see most of the advanced societies today are getting older. The percentage of working population is diminishing. India is again one of those few countries, which shows an upward trend. China is going to be much more downward than anybody else because of their one child policy which they have had in place for a long time.
The population, which was our bane some years ago, is today coming to our advantage. Much of it is educated population and therefor they are going to be doing many more things in the years to come. So the way the world is looking at India is now different.
New Zealand was at one time a country that seemed far away, not so anymore thanks to faster air travel and instant communication media – the world is pretty much a borderless global village today. So one is transacting business, doing things from far away. Therefore there is much that we need to do to promote this kind of relationship between our two countries and I think that is one of the priority areas that I will take forward and in this the economic aspects, especially trade, will take precedence over everything else.
Are there any specifics that you are looking at concentrating on in the near term.
I would set myself two goals. One is to improve the economic relationship through greater trade and commerce and the second is to improve the people to people relationship because if you have face to face contact, it makes a lot of difference in the way you think.
There is a perception here that the Indian government is somewhat slow on the progress of arriving at the Free Trade Agreement with New Zealand especially after the new government came to power after elections last year. Better progress seemed to have been made under the dispensation of the previous government’s minister, Mr Kamal Nath…
No, there is no change in the dispensation and I think the new minister is pretty pushy himself and we have progressed – maybe I am not sure how much – we are only awaiting final political clearance from India to be able to get in the dialogue stage, we are at that stage and I am pretty hopeful that that will happen. You are well aware that India is quite a large country and there are so many other things that come up. The document that had to be prepared has been prepared and that has been put up to ask for the formal negotiations to start on the FTA and it is waiting that final clearance at the highest level.
What is the expected time frame?
These things do take a little while in the Prime Minister’s Office because the agenda is quite huge. Let me assure you that in my own discussions in New Delhi, this is a priority item – I know it is with the Prime Minister himself. It’s a priority ticket.
The recent announcement that the citizens of New Zealand would get a visa on arrival – what triggered that, what got New Zealand on the list of just 5 countries?
Basically promotion of tourism is an important field and it was felt that some of this was hampering the arrival of people, so therefore this scheme has been introduced. We do expect a lot of tourism from New Zealand to India – that’s why New Zealand has been included in that.
In your perception what are the areas for trade cooperation between India and New Zealand, what do you see New Zealand offering India?
Well, New Zealand has been very keen on pushing more of their dairy products into India, but I would say there is a lot scope in farming technology, which India can benefit from – especially post harvest handling and preservation technology. That is an area in which we are pretty weak. It is surprising that we have not done anything about it but the amount of grain that we lose every year is colossal.
Food preservation, processing – I think that would be a priority. Then we have of course a lot of prowess in IT and medium sized machinery, which is a requirement over here, so possibly that is one area that could see a little more growth.
We have been taking timber and wool from here, so that will continue. In fact we have a trade deficit at this point of about 60% in favour of New Zealand so we would definitely benefit by the FTA when more of our products come here.
What about post-production in film? New Zealand has some great post-production studios – do you see possibilities of post-production cooperation with Bollywood?
Indeed. We have a lot to learn from New Zealand onpost-production techniques and technology – so those are the places that could find increasing cooperation between the two countries.
You said one of the reasons for the visa on arrival was to encourage tourism but one sees that most of Indian promotion in New Zealand is run out of Sydney from the Incredible India office, so is there any proposal to step up promotions for Indian tourism here?
We’ll have to work on that ourselves. Efforts are on in every department in India including Incredible India to educate people on visiting India. So, yes, there will an effort form our side to encourage more of this and get people to come.
Are you looking at more cultural exchange between New Zealand and India?
Indeed. There is also what we call it, Know India Programme in which we are sending at least half a dozen kids at that level go across and spend time over there. Then there is a chair which is being organised regularly through ICCR in those fields, for somebody to work in India for a few months at a time and similarly for somebody from India to come here to Victoria University, and so on. So these exchanges and visits would certainly help in bringing about greater visibility.
What about education?
Yes, from the New Zealand point of view, they have been looking forward to that, the need to have more people to come and study over here. Lots of our people are studying over here but yes we can have more.
One constant refrain from the Indian community here is that student visa processing in India from New Zealand side doesn’t happen fast enough and there aren’t enough centers, resulting in a big backlog.
We need to work together to analyse such problems and find ways and means to get rid of bottlenecks – we are quite clear that travel must be made easy for whosoever it might be.
Is there short message you would have for the Indian community here, which you would like Indian Weekender to convey?
Well, the Indian diaspora is the face of India abroad and the way we conduct ourselves over here is what makes people form an impression of what the country is. So we certainly need to make sure that we put the right image across, and make sure that we work united towards taking the relationship between our two countries forward, particularly in the areas which I have outlined earlier and it is for this community to make sure that they do proper justice to the country of their origin. I am sure you will realise that we should not get into squabbling to create a multiplicity of organisations ultimately making them dysfunctional. Of course India is a huge country, there is no doubt about it, but we need to make sure that we don’t allow these fissiparous tendencies to come about and we work together for the larger aim – and the larger aim is, will always be, to take the relationship between our two countries to a higher plane.
What do you think of the change from heading one of the biggest wings of the Indian armed forces to diplomacy?Well, to begin with, in both instances you work for the policies of the government – and there’s diplomacy in both. The navy is somewhat different from the other armed forces in that it has...
What do you think of the change from heading one of the biggest wings of the Indian armed forces to diplomacy?
Well, to begin with, in both instances you work for the policies of the government – and there’s diplomacy in both. The navy is somewhat different from the other armed forces in that it has diplomacy as one of the rules of the game. Traditionally it has been so: there is a miliary role, there is a policing role and then there is the diplomatic role. That’s the traditional triangle that we have had always for all navies, developed by the Royal Navy way back in 19th century.
In fact there is a piece that I came across where at one time the funding for the Royal Navy was being reduced so the first Sea Lord, the chief of the Royal Navy, went up to the government and said, since he had no money they would not be building any more ships and then the foreign minister came up and he said, look if the Royal Navy does not get more ships then how do you expect the foreign ministry to do the job that it was supposed to do?
What I am saying is that there has always been a link between the navy and diplomacy – we send ships abroad, fly the flag. Our ships are, shall we say, the sovereign Indian territory on the sea and wherever they visit they represent a mini India and that’s been happening to all the countries. Having said that, this is it is definitely quite a different kind of a job and I am still finding my feet but as I said, in my last job, interacting with my peers, my counterparts also with the ministerial set ups in many countries was part of the job. I was travelling several times a year to different countries and building up a rapport meeting with defence ministers and officials. So it was a little bit of, shall I say, grooming for this kind of a job. I am very happy that our government asked me to come to New Zealand.
To use a phrase from your previous stellar career, you are still testing the waters here in New Zealand at the moment. What are your first impressions?
My first impressions are that as far as people are concerned they are particularly good across the board, hospitable, approachable, full of life always.
What message do you bring to this country?
The thing that has really changed over the years now, more so in the recent past, is the fact that India has arrived. This is because of the economic growth of the past decade or so. It is also very noticeable that while the whole world is going through a recession, India is one of the few countries, which has maintained a decent growth in GDP.
All of us are familiar with it, and we probably clock 7% this year while everybody else has gone negative. So we’ve had no recession, we’ve had growth and it stems from two factors – one is that we have a very strong middle class and this middle is the one that is making money, driving the economy, driving consumption and this middle class is 300 million plus that is equal to the population of the entire United States but there are another 800-900 million that have to go along. Now it is a very noticeable change in their lifestyle also. If you are in India, it is quite noticeable but there is a long way to go still. The government is taking steps, hopefully the trickle down effect will percolate, permeate to the lowest masses.
So the way the world is now looking at India because of this 300 million educated population, and the second part is demographics because if you see most of the advanced societies today are getting older. The percentage of working population is diminishing. India is again one of those few countries, which shows an upward trend. China is going to be much more downward than anybody else because of their one child policy which they have had in place for a long time.
The population, which was our bane some years ago, is today coming to our advantage. Much of it is educated population and therefor they are going to be doing many more things in the years to come. So the way the world is looking at India is now different.
New Zealand was at one time a country that seemed far away, not so anymore thanks to faster air travel and instant communication media – the world is pretty much a borderless global village today. So one is transacting business, doing things from far away. Therefore there is much that we need to do to promote this kind of relationship between our two countries and I think that is one of the priority areas that I will take forward and in this the economic aspects, especially trade, will take precedence over everything else.
Are there any specifics that you are looking at concentrating on in the near term.
I would set myself two goals. One is to improve the economic relationship through greater trade and commerce and the second is to improve the people to people relationship because if you have face to face contact, it makes a lot of difference in the way you think.
There is a perception here that the Indian government is somewhat slow on the progress of arriving at the Free Trade Agreement with New Zealand especially after the new government came to power after elections last year. Better progress seemed to have been made under the dispensation of the previous government’s minister, Mr Kamal Nath…
No, there is no change in the dispensation and I think the new minister is pretty pushy himself and we have progressed – maybe I am not sure how much – we are only awaiting final political clearance from India to be able to get in the dialogue stage, we are at that stage and I am pretty hopeful that that will happen. You are well aware that India is quite a large country and there are so many other things that come up. The document that had to be prepared has been prepared and that has been put up to ask for the formal negotiations to start on the FTA and it is waiting that final clearance at the highest level.
What is the expected time frame?
These things do take a little while in the Prime Minister’s Office because the agenda is quite huge. Let me assure you that in my own discussions in New Delhi, this is a priority item – I know it is with the Prime Minister himself. It’s a priority ticket.
The recent announcement that the citizens of New Zealand would get a visa on arrival – what triggered that, what got New Zealand on the list of just 5 countries?
Basically promotion of tourism is an important field and it was felt that some of this was hampering the arrival of people, so therefore this scheme has been introduced. We do expect a lot of tourism from New Zealand to India – that’s why New Zealand has been included in that.
In your perception what are the areas for trade cooperation between India and New Zealand, what do you see New Zealand offering India?
Well, New Zealand has been very keen on pushing more of their dairy products into India, but I would say there is a lot scope in farming technology, which India can benefit from – especially post harvest handling and preservation technology. That is an area in which we are pretty weak. It is surprising that we have not done anything about it but the amount of grain that we lose every year is colossal.
Food preservation, processing – I think that would be a priority. Then we have of course a lot of prowess in IT and medium sized machinery, which is a requirement over here, so possibly that is one area that could see a little more growth.
We have been taking timber and wool from here, so that will continue. In fact we have a trade deficit at this point of about 60% in favour of New Zealand so we would definitely benefit by the FTA when more of our products come here.
What about post-production in film? New Zealand has some great post-production studios – do you see possibilities of post-production cooperation with Bollywood?
Indeed. We have a lot to learn from New Zealand onpost-production techniques and technology – so those are the places that could find increasing cooperation between the two countries.
You said one of the reasons for the visa on arrival was to encourage tourism but one sees that most of Indian promotion in New Zealand is run out of Sydney from the Incredible India office, so is there any proposal to step up promotions for Indian tourism here?
We’ll have to work on that ourselves. Efforts are on in every department in India including Incredible India to educate people on visiting India. So, yes, there will an effort form our side to encourage more of this and get people to come.
Are you looking at more cultural exchange between New Zealand and India?
Indeed. There is also what we call it, Know India Programme in which we are sending at least half a dozen kids at that level go across and spend time over there. Then there is a chair which is being organised regularly through ICCR in those fields, for somebody to work in India for a few months at a time and similarly for somebody from India to come here to Victoria University, and so on. So these exchanges and visits would certainly help in bringing about greater visibility.
What about education?
Yes, from the New Zealand point of view, they have been looking forward to that, the need to have more people to come and study over here. Lots of our people are studying over here but yes we can have more.
One constant refrain from the Indian community here is that student visa processing in India from New Zealand side doesn’t happen fast enough and there aren’t enough centers, resulting in a big backlog.
We need to work together to analyse such problems and find ways and means to get rid of bottlenecks – we are quite clear that travel must be made easy for whosoever it might be.
Is there short message you would have for the Indian community here, which you would like Indian Weekender to convey?
Well, the Indian diaspora is the face of India abroad and the way we conduct ourselves over here is what makes people form an impression of what the country is. So we certainly need to make sure that we put the right image across, and make sure that we work united towards taking the relationship between our two countries forward, particularly in the areas which I have outlined earlier and it is for this community to make sure that they do proper justice to the country of their origin. I am sure you will realise that we should not get into squabbling to create a multiplicity of organisations ultimately making them dysfunctional. Of course India is a huge country, there is no doubt about it, but we need to make sure that we don’t allow these fissiparous tendencies to come about and we work together for the larger aim – and the larger aim is, will always be, to take the relationship between our two countries to a higher plane.
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